Headliner
Nine Orchard, Corner Bar and Lobby Lounge
Like a number of grand downtown commercial structures, the 1912 Beaux-Arts building that housed the Jarmulowsky Bank in the Lower East Side has been repurposed into a hotel. DLJ Real Estate Capital Partners, the building’s owner, oversaw the completion of the restoration. The guest rooms at the hotel, Nine Orchard, will be available for booking on June 20, but two of its three dining spaces — Corner Bar, a bistro, and Lobby Lounge — are already serving food and drinks. Mattos Hospitality, the chef Ignacio Mattos’s company, will run these, along with the Amado Grill, an intimate, 44-seat fine-dining restaurant to open in September adjacent to Corner Bar. (Mattos Hospitality also operates Lodi in Rockefeller Center, Estela and Altro Paradiso.) Mr. Mattos, who once lived in the neighborhood and accepted the opportunity to handle food and beverage for the hotel, including room service, said he was smitten with the assignment. Corner Bar will emphasize tavern food, with raw-bar specialties, chicken liver mousse, steak au poivre, cod with leeks, roasted chicken with morels, boudin blanc, and spaghetti with tomato sauce; it will be open for breakfast and dinner, with lunch to follow soon. The wine list will be American because, as Mr. Mattos put it, visitors should be able to appreciate what’s being made here. The Lobby Lounge, installed in a former bank teller room with arched windows and a vaulted ceiling, will offer cocktails with small plates like oysters, cheeses and shrimp cocktail, and will also add tea service. Plans are in the works for a private event space on the 14th-floor rooftop.
9 Orchard Street (Canal Street), 212-804-9900, cornerbarnyc.com, nineorchard.com.
Opening
53
This elaborate new contemporary Asian restaurant is a departure for Ahmass Fakahany’s Altamarea Group, known for Italian dining. Mr. Fakahany lived in Asia for 10 years and said he has long been tempted to try his hand at an “Asian cuisine experience.” Designed by ICRAVE and installed in the new Jean Nouvel-designed apartment tower, just west of the Museum of Modern Art, the restaurant has a dramatic cocktail lounge set under a series of half-dome slats on the ground floor. Beneath the lounge is the main dining room, covered by a roof with a continuation of the slats in a rainbow of colors. Akmal Anuar, who is from Singapore and runs restaurants in Asia and the Middle East, is the chef and a partner. At his side is Mark Yu, the executive chef, whose experience is rooted in New York at Pastis and Catch. On their menu, appetizers, including some dim sum like crystal dumplings and seaweed-cured fluke, are grouped as hot or cold; other dishes are filed according to technique, like steamed (razor clams, bok choy), grilled (lamb ribs), clay pot (duck, tiger prawn), and wok (quail, pea shoots). The name is a reference to the street it’s on and the building number. (Opens Wednesday)
53 West 53rd Street, 646-535-3994, 53-nyc.com.
Coco Shack
The restaurateur Pino Luongo is on the move. A short while ago, he moved his restaurant, Coco Pazzo, from Prince Street to 307 Spring Street (Hudson Street), which he took over last year, and changed the name to Coco Pazzo Trattoria. Now he’s opening this seafood spot, not far from the old Coco Pazzo space. Its Italian roots can be found in crudo and tagliolini with sea urchin, but he goes much farther afield with swordfish tacos, seafood paella, and shrimp and grits. The chef, David Camara, worked in Hawaii. (Friday)
184 Prince Street (Sullivan Street), 917-675-7500, cocoshacknyc.com.
Noortwyck
Andrew Quinn, who was an executive sous-chef at Eleven Madison Park, has joined with Cedric Nicaise, a former wine director there, to open this American restaurant with a seasonal approach in the corner space that housed John Fraser’s the Loyal until the pandemic. The English-born Mr. Quinn’s menu features curried cashews, scallop crudo with grapefruit, kale salad with avocado, salmon with peppers and tomato, smoked hanger steak with spring onions, cherry tart with almonds, and, for an English touch, lemon posset with ice cream and rhubarb. The 70-seat room is done in earthy tones, and the name is said to be the colloquial Dutch for “North District,” at one time the name for the area that is now the West Village. Bridgette Zou is also a partner, handling the business’s creative and marketing aspects.
289 Bleecker Street (Seventh Avenue South), thenoortwyck.com.
